A Special Visit

Last weekend we headed up to the Wasatch mountains for a little camping.  Just a one-nighter (all you can handle with kids).  We drove quite a while to find the most beautiful spot.  It was in the middle of a clearing with loads of wild flowers, tall pine trees, and nothing but huge mountains surrounding us.  We were the only people for a few miles.

A view on the way to our site.

We roasted marshmallows and sat by the fire.  Jon and I put the kids to bed and listened to Sophie chatter to Jonah for about an hour before we decided to go to bed as well.

Jonah was fast asleep when we got in the tent but Sophie was as awake as ever.  It only took a moment to discover the thing keeping her awake--a giant poop.  We changed her and put her back down and tried to get some sleep.

I tossed and turned for about an hour trying to calm down when I finally decided to lean over to ask Jon if he was sleeping.  He said no.  I told him, "I'm terrified."  And he said, "Me too."  That was about the point we knew we wouldn't be getting any sleep that night.  We both thought we heard noises outside and couldn't relax enough to sleep.

The moon was extremely bright and I threw another log on the fire during a midnight potty break to keep up the illusion of safety.  Jon said, "Les Stroud always keeps a fire burning at night to keep the critters away."  And that made us feel better.

I feel in and out of sleep until I was woken up by a bear-like moan.  The noise seemed to be about 10 yards from the tent.  I sat straight up and listened for any other signs I should fear.  About 30 seconds later, just outside our tent I heard loud breathing--sort of "huffing" noises.  It was obviously coming from a very large animal.  Then the footsteps came, loud and heavy--displacing a lot of grass and weeds.  I was mortified.  I woke Jon up and whispered and pointed, "There's something out there."  When he sat up and listened, sure enough, we heard the same breathing and large footsteps.  I began to panic and reached for the key fob to turn the alarm on to frighten whatever it was away.  We were too far from our car, though, and it wouldn't work.  This didn't stop me from methodically and quickly continuing to press all the buttons hoping it would magically decide to turn on.  Jon opened the hatchet and held it ready in his hand.

I prayed aloud that Heavenly Father would make it go away and that we'd be safe.  I asked Jon what we should do.  I was ready to get up and scream and make noise to get it to leave.  But after Jon said a prayer of his own he looked calm and said, "We need to be quiet."  So we were.  We waited in absolute fear and terror for whatever it was to leave.  I was sure at any moment, the tent would be invaded and one of us wouldn't be going home later.  All I could think about were my sleeping babies who had no idea what was going on.  I thought of that 11 year old boy from American Fork that was dragged out of his tent by a black bear 3 years ago and eaten.

About 5 minutes passed and we heard no more noises so we decided we'd get up, start the fire quickly and begin to pack our bags.  It was only 4:30am.  Sophie woke when she heard us leaving the tent so I grabbed her and brought her out with us.  Jonah woke up just a few minutes later saying, "Guys, it's morning time!"  I didn't bother trying to get them back to sleep and started packing up the tent and chairs while Jon kept watch.

Jon pulled the car closer (but started the alarm several times on the way to get it to make sure nothing was lurking) and we loaded up.  By 5:45 we were in the car heading home.  We didn't talk about whatever it was until we were safely in the car.  We both concluded it was a bear.

When we got home at 7am we put the kids in bed (they were exhausted) and Jon started researching bear noises.  He found this noise (listen under "Apprehensive expressions"), which is exactly what we heard outside our tent (except for the chattering teeth).

Not my idea of a fun night.

 Glad all our shoes made it home, if you know what I mean.